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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/27946667">How Long Has It Been?</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphose/pseuds/sapphose'>sapphose</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Deep Space Nine</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Angst, Gen or Pre-Slash, Implied/Referenced Torture, M/M, Non-Linear Narrative, justintimefest</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2021-01-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2021-01-18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-10 23:21:22</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,269</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/27946667</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/sapphose/pseuds/sapphose</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Garak and Julian are captured by an unknown enemy. Told in snapshots of before, and during, and after, in no particular order.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Julian Bashir/Elim Garak</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>28</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>74</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Collections:</b></td><td>Star Trek: Just in Time Fest</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>How Long Has It Been?</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>I have never tried to write anything like this before, but I'm fascinated by non-linear narratives so I wanted to try one for this challenge. Thank you for joining me in the experiment. I can't promise it makes any sense but it should at least be interesting.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>There was a distinct advantage, Garak realized, in Julian’s uncanny ability to keep track of time.</p><p>He didn’t know exactly how the scientists had ensured that. Was there a specific gene combination for timekeeping? Had it been designed purposefully, or was it an accident?</p><p>Ultimately, of course, the <em>why</em> was immaterial. He could ask, “How long has it been?”</p><p>And Julian would answer “36 hours,” immediately and accurately.</p><p>It was a well-known trait of Cardassians that they liked to keep track of such details. There was a comfort to it.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“How long has it been?” Garak asked, wincing as gentle fingers probed the bruise developing above his eye.</p><p>“Two hours,” Julian answered, voice soft as his touch. “You probably have a concussion. I haven’t seen any of our captors yet, but the force field is definitely live.”</p><p>There were worse people to be kidnapped with, at least.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“Two weeks. Two bloody weeks, Garak, and they’ve pulled me in there every damn day. There’s no point to it! Studies show that information gained under torture is rarely reliable.” Julian was vibrating with energy. In other circumstances, Garak suspected, he would be up and pacing the room, but as it was he was stuck with lying on his side and scowling viciously.</p><p>“For humans, perhaps,” Garak responded non-commitally. He knew Julian was not in the mood to hear the Cardassian opinion on the subject. Instead, Garak focused on wrapping the bandage as he had been instructed, binding Julian’s broken limb to stillness as best he could.</p><p>“They aren’t even asking me any questions. They drag me into that room, beat me bloody, then drag me back here. Why? What’s the point to it?”</p><p>That was, probably, a rhetorical question. Julian wasn’t expecting an answer.</p><p>Still… would there be comfort in one?</p><p>“You feel disoriented, out of control, confused, and helpless. That is, most likely, the point.”</p><p>Julian looked at him sharply then, with narrowed eyes.</p><p>“Did someone tell you that while you were tailoring for them?”</p><p>Garak smiled.</p><p>“I’ve had many chatty customers, you know.”</p><p>The suspicion had taken too much out of Julian; he lay his head back down again, exhausted.</p><p>“Tell me something, Garak. You’ve admitted, to my face, that you were a member of the Order. Multiple times. Why lie about it now?”</p><p>Julian would never understand Garak, if he still asked that question.</p><p>“You may be interested in something someone told me once while I was taking in their dress,” Garak said conversationally. “It is only a confession if it has been recorded.”</p><p>A Cardassian saying, if ever there was one. They did so love their records.</p><p>Julian frowned, either at Garak or the pain, or both.</p><p>“What comes next?”</p><p>“You teaching me how to keep you from puncturing your lungs when our friends knock your ribs loose.”</p><p>“No. I mean, with this. The torture. The beatings. What comes next?” Julian’s eyes pierced Garak’s, freezing the denial of knowledge in his throat. “Don’t I have a right to know?”</p><p>It wouldn’t help. Knowledge of what’s to come never eased the pain. Still, Garak could deny Julian nothing.</p><p>“Perhaps they don’t want information. They could simply be creating a sense of urgency for Starfleet to pay some kind of ransom. Or they may be waiting for you to break. To fall to the floor weeping and screaming that you’ll tell them anything they want to know, if only they stop the pain.”</p><p>“Unlikely,” Julian muttered.</p><p>Maybe it was. Garak never interrogated a member of Starfleet, after all.</p><p>Not all breaking was so dramatic. Some men snapped silently. One day, they simply stopped responding. They might answer all your questions then, or never answer anything again.</p><p>Garak did not want that for Julian.</p><p>He hesitated, chewing on his next words before speaking them into existence.</p><p>“This will continue. For another week at least, I think, before they make their next move. They may begin asking you questions then. Or introduce another method. Or, perhaps, you may go in and find someone new there who appears to be quite reasonable, who will apologize for everything you’ve been through and offer you fresh clothes and a decent meal, and ask you questions so seemingly insignificant you won’t mind answering. And then when you’re comfortable and trusting, perhaps they may ask you more questions, and if you refuse you may find they have a new, more… targeted method than before.” He had said too much, and Julian’s eyes told him so.</p><p>“Is that what you did?”</p><p>“We’re speaking purely in hypotheticals,” Garak said, which meant <em>yes</em>.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p><em>How long has it been</em>, asked the voice of Tain in his nightmares, and Garak couldn’t ignore it, never could. <em>How long has it been since you did that to another person?</em></p><p>It was possible they didn’t even want information from Julian, it was possible they were torturing him to torture Garak, but he could not tell Julian so, because then Julian would rightfully resent him for it.</p><p>He couldn’t tell Julian he invented that technique.</p><p>He couldn’t tell Julian that he was afraid he was the one that was going to break, with the ghost of Tain and one thousand murdered men inside his head.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“It’s still been 48 hours. It won’t change if you keep asking.” Julian’s tone was fondly teasing, and Garak didn’t know how to explain, that when he did not know anything at all- not where they were or who they were held by or why- he had to have some kind of information. Knowing <em>when</em> would hold his sanity together.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“How long has it been?”</p><p>“I don’t know,” Julian said, voice breaking, and Garak felt it was a kindness not to point out that perhaps that was one of their captors’ goals, too.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>The rescue, when it came, came just in time. Garak would not have trusted himself with the fragile state of Julian’s skeletal system any longer.</p><p>His own fragile mental state, unfortunately, continued to be his own responsibility.</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“How long has it been since we went on a trip together?” Julian asked cheekily, looking up from the controls. “You used to take me out more, I recall.”</p><p>“Yes, until I realized that Captain Sisko seemed rather put out about your unusual runabout requests,” Garak responded from the passenger seat. <em>Until I realized how dangerous </em><em>spending time with you will be for me</em>.</p><p>He distracted instead of answering, pointing to a blip on the screen and asking, “My dear doctor, have you noticed there’s another vessel approaching?”</p><p>“I don’t recognize it. Hang on- damn! It looks like they’re arming photon torpedoes, we need to get shields up <em>now</em>-”</p><p> </p><p>**</p><p>“How long has it been,” Julian began slowly, kind to the point of painful, “since you talked to someone about what you’ve been through? Instead of just ignoring it and pretending it didn’t happen.”</p><p>That implied Garak had <em>ever</em> talked to someone about it. Had he?</p><p>How long since the wire, since the closest he had ever come to truly being able to confess?</p><p>“I’m here,” Julian said to the silence, “if you want to talk.”</p><p>That was another question to ponder. How long had it been, since someone had truly cared about Elim Garak?</p><p>How long since the idea of Julian caring about him had become more appealing than frightening?</p><p>How odd, the passage of time.</p><p>“I can’t promise I will want to talk, Doctor. But the least I can do is offer you a cup of tea.”</p><p>How long had it been, in all this war and chaos, since they had taken a moment to sit together, at peace?</p>
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